IB IDEAL PRO Trade USDJPY, need HELP!

I tried to trade USDJPY today

First trade via IDEAL PRP for this cross

rate 117.75

I wanted to buy 4000 QTY via TWS it said may trade was under $25000 mimimum order...

How 25000/117.75 = 212 minimum order, I thought

4000 USDJY margin is 30:1 so needs $16k in my account..

What have I got wrong...

I thought...

1 USD = 117.75 JPY

Therefore buying USDJPY 4000 equals $471000 USD @ rate of 117.75

 

Well, your order as placed was to buy 4000 USD. If you want to buy 471K USD, put in an order to buy 471k....

 

So hows the margin calculated...

when its 30:1 how much do I need in my account to buy $471k

 

Actually 4000 = $4000 or 471,000 YEN

 

They moved it down to 2% today I think, so $471,000 * .02 = $9,420

(if 30:1 then .0333 * 471,000 = $15,699)

 

Thats margin in YEN , not margin in USD is it not,,,

SO the QTY you load into TWS is always USD...

 

Ok I am stuck

SAY I BUY USDJPY at 117.75

And my max loss of USD dollars is to be only $10,000 usd to my account

And my stop loss was to be placed at 117.00

Question : How much YEN can I buy ? Or what the f**k do I load into TWS in the QTY screen....

 

What you enter is dollars, say $500,000 at 117.75 that equals 58,875,000 YEN. The margin will be 2% of $500,000 or $10,000, make sense?

 

Into TWS I load YEN, so I load 58M yen

 

I'll let someone else explain, I was never good at teaching especially when its not face to face.